Exclusive: Fake Rockefeller says he will prove his innocence in cold case murder

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Attorney Brad Bailey with Christian Karl Gewrhartsreiter who was found guilt of first degree murder at Clara Shortridge Foltz Criminal Justice Center in Los Angeles Monday, April 10, 2013. He has pleaded not guilty to the killing of John Sohus, 27, who disappeared with his wife, Linda, in 1985 while Gerhartsreiter was a guest cottage tenant at the home of Sohus’ mother, where the couple lived. (Photo by Walt Mancini/SGVN)

LOS ANGELES – In a telephone interview Friday from the Los Angeles County Men’s Central Jail, a man who once posed as a member of the Rockefeller family and was convicted for his role in a 1985 San Marino bludgeoning murder said he could prove his innocence.

Christian Karl Gerhartsreiter, 52, aka Clark Rockefeller, said he hopes Superior Court Judge George Lomeli will permit him to read aloud a lengthy motion. The handwritten document, not yet filed, lays out what Gerhartsreiter believes is his best shot for a new trial.

Sentencing in the case is scheduled to take place Thursday at the Clara Shortridge Foltz Criminal Justice Center, according to District Attorney spokeswoman Shiara Davila-Morales.

Gerhartsreiter faces 27 years to life for killing John Sohus, trisecting the body and burying Sohus in his mother’s backyard on Lorain Road.

“This is not a traditional motion,” Gerhartsreiter said. “I have reviewed all of the evidence and it irrefutably shows I had nothing to do with this.”

Sohus and his wife Linda disappeared from the home they shared with John’s mother Didi in early February 1985. Gerhartsreiter, then known as Christopher Chichester, rented a room in a back house on the property.

Last month, Lomeli told Gerhartsreiter that he could not use his court appearance as a “fishing expedition.” The judge did say he would listen to the claim of new findings.

“You stated something about having new evidence about the whereabouts of Linda Sohus and so forth,” Lomeli said, “and I’m not even sure that’s a legitimate basis but I’m going to hear you out on whatever motion you memorialize that in.”

Gerhartsreiter, who called himself the XIII baronet of Chichester, disappeared from San Marino in May or June of 1985. Didi Sohus sold her house in late 1985. A pool contractor doing work for the new homeowner dug up John Sohus’ body in May 1994. Linda Sohus has not been heard from since she vanished.

By 1994, Gerhartsreiter had drifted across the country, first turning up in Greenwich Connecticut as Christopher Crowe, then moving on to Manhattan, Boston and Cornish, New Hampshire, under the guise of Clark Rockefeller.

In the early 1990s, he married Sandra Boss, a management consultant with McKinsey. The couple had a child but divorced in 2007. During a supervised visit in 2008, Gerhartsreiter abducted the little girl and fled to Baltimore, where he took on the identity Chip Smith.

He was arrested by the FBI, convicted in the parental abduction, then shipped to California to face trial for the Sohus murder. Key pieces of evidence linking him to the slaying included a plastic book bag from the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee, where Gerhartsreiter was a student in 1980.

Describing his court filing as several thousand words, Gerhartsreiter said he drew from testimony at trial to put together a compelling case for his innocence. He said a portion of the motion will focus on Boss’ testimony and an article that appeared in a New Hampshire newspaper in 2005 or 2006.

During the 10-minute interview Friday, Gerhartsreiter said he would not allege there had been juror misconduct, prosecutorial misconduct or judicial error.

“That just theater,” he said. “I think if I’m allowed to present my evidence it will be very convincing.”